Nursing Majors’ Attitudes Toward Suicide and Mental Health Training

AbstractThe mental health training of nursing majors may play a role in their levels of confidence in attending to suicide patients as working professionals. The purpose of this quantitative study was to explore what impact, if any, attitudes toward suicide had on nursing majors’ levels of confidence in their mental health training. Pender’s health promotion theory was the theoretical framework. A descriptive correlational survey was used to explore individuals majoring in nursing confidence and perceived skills in mental health training. The 4 research questions asked the relationship between the level of confidence in helping someone with a mental health problem and deliberate self-harm and attitudes to suicide, and between the level of perceived skill in helping someone with a mental health problem and deliberate self-harm and attitudes to suicide. SurveyMonkey was used to collect data from 110 nursing student participants who completed the Attitude Toward Suicide instrument and Mental Health Training and Confidence Questionnaire. The Software Statistical Package for Social Science was used to analyze the reliability, as tested with Cronbach’s alpha. Descriptive statistics and Spearman’s rho were used. The predictor variable attitude toward suicide was less meaningful than the lack of confidence in mental health training. The lack of significance in the findings of the research questions did not compromise the value of the study. Recommendations include incorporating specific suicide prevention education and training in nursing education curricula. Addressing the public health problem of suicide in all areas of nursing curricula may bolster nurses’ confidence in their ability to care for such patients effectively, leading to positive social change